


Turing Test

by franticatlantic



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-18
Updated: 2019-07-19
Packaged: 2020-06-30 11:15:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 17,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19852009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/franticatlantic/pseuds/franticatlantic
Summary: After having spent several years as a beat cop in Forest Park - one of the most crime-ridden neighborhoods in Detroit - Lorna Russo is finally starting her year of training to become a detective. She's assigned to Lieutenant Hank Anderson and neither of them are particularly happy about it. They are also assigned an android partner, Connor, a new model sent by CyberLife to help them investigate deviancy in other androids. Lorna is immediately drawn to Connor, yet tries to keep her dark secrets from him while reminding herself he's not alive.





	1. Chapter 1

**NOVEMBER 5TH, 2038**  
11:25 PM  
  
It was almost midnight, and there was still no sign of Lieutenant Hank Anderson.

The rain had slowed its deluge, but was still steady enough to soak the officers surveying the front yard in a matter of minutes.

Lorna stood on the porch, an old wooden thing that creaked every time she so much as shifted. Her hands were shoved deep in her pockets, her chin tucked neatly inside the collar of her jacket. Thankfully the overhang kept her dry from the rain, but it did nothing to quell the chill that ran through her.

Fingers going numb, she retrieved her phone and checked the time once more. The clock ticked over to 11:30 as she looked. She _tsk_ 'ed, and the phone found its way back into her pocket.

_Fucking Anderson. Probably not even going to show._

She wondered, then, if the android assigned to them would come. It wasn't like either of them could do much without Anderson there, but they could at least take a look around.

There was, after all, a dead man just inside. And the DPD should be glad to get this thing over and done with as fast as possible. 'Should' being the operative word. There was always _protocol_ and all.

As late and as wet as it was, there were still people milling about just beyond the bright yellow caution strip cordoning the yard off, reporters huddling under umbrellas, waiting to hear any news. Waiting to see them drag Ortiz's body out on a gurney, more like. Lorna didn't expect to glance across the street and see a withered old man in a jellabah loitering at the corner smoking and looking up at the sky where Lorna saw the silver glint of an airplane.

Just as she was about to call it a night, tell Detective Collins that she'd be back tomorrow, hopefully with Anderson in tow, a car drove by, headlights cutting through the rain, and skidded to a stop at the curb. An old thing, manual, something you hardly ever saw anymore amongst the flying cars, the electronics, the automatics.

Lorna screwed her face up at the relic and realized that had to be Anderson. Musty old bitch.

The man's grey head appeared, disgruntled expression and all, followed by the rest of his body. Light brown jacket over a couple layers of plaid, dirty old jeans with alcohol stains on them. She'd seen him around the precinct a few times, but had never spoken to him. Truthfully, he seemed like an asshole.

Moving slowly (not a surprise, due to the pounds he'd packed on in recent years), he began to saunter up the sidewalk toward the house.

Immediately, one of the reporters who had pounced on Lorna upon her arrival at the scene, was on Hank. "Joss Douglas, channel 16. Can you confirm that this is a homicide?"

Anderson's reply was curt, almost a growl. "I'm not confirming anything."

That had been Lorna's exact reply when _Joss_ had asked her, too.

With a grind of her heel against the creaky dark wood, Lorna called back into the house, "He's here."

A moment later, another head appeared out of the lieutenant's car, from the passenger side. This time the head was dark, the eyes equally so, the body clothed in a suit jacket with a glowing blue armband around the right bicep. 'RK800' shone in white letters from just above the right breast pocket.

He wore dark jeans and black shoes and an unreadable expression. The circular LED at his temple was a calm blue.

The android.

As Anderson came through the caution sign, Lorna finally stepped back out into the rain, boots squelching through the mud the yard had turned into overnight.

A terse "Lieutenant Anderson" got the man's attention, and she extended a hand. "Lorna Russo. I'm supposed to be --"

Behind the lieutenant, Officer Chris Miller was telling the RK800 that no androids were allowed within the confines of the crime scene.

Anderon interrupted Lorna to turn and bark, "It's with me."

Chris looked confused, and mildly disgusted, but waved the android forward as per Anderson's order.

The RK800 advanced on the two of them, and Lorna's hand faltered where it was still held out in waiting for a shake from Anderson that probably wouldn't come.

This android was...well, it was _cute_. It had wide dark eyes and a disarming smile which it turned on Lorna as the LED at its temple flashed yellow.

"What part of 'stay in the car' didn't you understand?" Anderson rasped at the android.

"Your order contradicted my instructions, Lieutenant."

Lorna's mouth fell open as the RK800 spoke. It had such a human lilt, it almost sounded like it was _backtalking_ the lieutenant, although she knew that couldn't be the case. Most androids still sounded robotic, perfunctory. Not this one. RK800 wasn't a model she was familiar with, though. And this was certainly the first android _detective_ she'd heard of. Maybe CyberLife was trying something new.

"You don't talk," Anderson growled, "you don't touch anything, and you stay outta my way. Got it?"

"Got it," was the android's reply, cursory.

Made to follow orders, Lorna supposed.

_As am I_ , she thought, as Anderson rounded back on her with a, "Same goes for you."

She was still so taken aback by this android, who was striding closer to her as Anderson moved out of the way, that she didn't even have a smart response for the lieutenant.

"Hi, I'm Connor," the RK800 extended its hand, another small smile on its face. "I'm the android sent by CyberLife."

Lorna stared at the droplets of rain cascading down Connor's face, over his shoulders, noticed that he didn't flinch as they hit him. Didn't have any reason to. "Lorna Russo, I'm training --"

"With Lieutenant Anderson, to become a detective." Connor's LED blinked yellow momentarily, before returning to a cool blue.

"How'd you know that?" She finally let go of Connor's hand, which had all the ridges and wrinkles of a normal hand, but was devoid of any calluses or even fingerprints.

Connor tilted his head. "I was briefed on the connection between you and Lieutenant Anderson beforehand. I also did a quick search just now through the DPD database for you. It helps if I gather as much information as possible, not only to assist you in your training, but to better help myself assimilate - and facilitate a relationship - with humans."

As Connor went on, Lorna was mostly mesmerized by his movements. How he seemed to breathe like a real person with real lungs, the way he moved his hands as he talked, even how his blinking came measured and precise every few seconds.

"I will do my best to aid Lieutenant Anderson in your training, as well as to solve the case as quickly and efficiently as possible. I hope we can work well together, as _partners_." He put special emphasis on that last word. Lorna supposed he was trying to 'facilitate a relationship' with her, as he so eloquently put it.

She could only nod, and eke out a small, "Sure."

This whole situation had just become extremely overwhelming.

Connor glanced up, then back at Lorna. "We should go inside. The longer we stand in the rain, the better chance you have of becoming ill. Which would hamper your ability to commence your training with the lieutenant."

Lorna nodded again, feeling like a fucking bobblehead.

They turned to head toward the porch, and Collins exited the front door, propped open by a brick, with his tablet still in hand.

Ben Collins was an older detective, one of the only officers who didn't judge Lorna for who her family was. He had joined the force only a couple years after Anderson. They'd served together long enough for Ben to remember when Hank was actually a _good_ cop, instead of the washed-up has-been he'd become.

Still, he gave Anderson a reprimanding look as he stepped down off the porch. "Evening, Hank. We were starting to think you weren't gonna show..."

"Yeah, that was the plan until this asshole-" he gestured to Connor "-found me."

_Good to know_. Lorna just barely avoided a roll of her eyes.

Collins chuckled, and Lorna noticed Hank did at least shake his hand. "So," Collins drawled as he started to lead them back toward the house, "you got yourself an android, huh?"

"Oh, very funny," Anderson spat, obviously not amused. He cast a nasty grimace back at Connor, who simply stared. "Just tell me what happened."

Lorna jumped in front of Collins, eyes pleading. Fuck Anderon's no talking rule. "May I?"

The detective eyed her for a moment, then shrugged. She'd been briefed on the situation when she arrived, and though she hadn't had a chance to search thoroughly through the scene, she remembered everything that had been relayed to her by Collins and the other officers. He'd correct her on anything she got wrong anyway.

Deciding on where to start, she began with, "DPD got a call around 8 PM from the landlord. The tenant hadn't paid his rent in months, so he thought he'd drop by, see what was going on..." They were coming up on the door now, the crooked metal mailbox reminding her of something from a horror flick. Lorna entered first with a gulp. "That's when he found the body."

The living room was _actually_ something from a horror movie. There was nothing to prepare her for the stench, not even having been inside and smelled it only an hour prior.

Anderson echoed her sentiments with a, "Jesus, that smell!" as he brought his hand up to cover his nose.

"Was even worse before we opened the windows," Lorna told him, now approaching the body.

Connor, of course, had no reaction.

The whole place was a mess - old carryout containers, empty bottles, and grocery bags littered the tables and floor. The wallpaper peeled, yellowed, from the walls. The couch and a recliner had been shoved out of the way to make more room for them to work.

The centerpiece of the disarray was a dead body, slumped against the bottom of the wall nearest the windows. Skin gray, hair matted, blood everywhere. He wasn't a small gentleman either, and the bright crime scene lights illuminated every roll, every pockmark, the big belly that spilled from underneath a dirty, upturned shirt. A shirt that had more than a few slices clean through the fabric, dried blood around the holes.

One of the more disturbing elements was something above the body, written in blood on the wall in neat - almost robotically so - letters. I AM ALIVE.

"The victim's name is Carlos Ortiz. He has a record for theft and battery --"

"Aggravated assault," Collins corrected her, thumbing through his tablet.

Lorna nodded, nose finding its way momentarily back inside her jacket. But nothing would mask that awful, rotting smell. "Sorry." She addressed Anderson once more. "According to the neighbors, he was kind of a loner. Stayed inside most of the time, they hardly ever saw him..."

She trailed off, because over Anderson's shoulder she could see Connor going to a small side table, on which were the remnants of Big Gulps, bags of potato chips, and a wide array of drugs. Most notable among them was the red ice. It spilled from a small, open baggie onto the table - red powder, almost like crushed brick. Which, coincidentally, was what some of the more distrustful dealers laced it with. And was what normally led to its user's death. Huffing brick isn't exactly healthy for you.

But that wasn't what had killed Carlos Ortiz.

"Uh, state he's in," Anderson muttered, as Connor abandoned the side table and went to kneel instead next to something on the floor near the entrance to the kitchen, "wasn't worth calling everyone out in the middle of the night. Could've waited 'til morning."

Lorna sidestepped just a bit, caught Connor examining exhibit 2, the bloody knife.

"I'd say he's been there for a good three weeks," Collins put in. "We'll know more when the coroner gets here."

In shock, Lorna saw Connor place two fingers on the blade of the knife, lifting them immediately to his mouth. He put them on his tongue, and she gagged a little, pointing. "Um. Is he supposed to be --"

"Tell me more," Anderson cut her off, and turned just as Connor was getting to his feet.

He was really starting to piss her off. Fine, then. Guess he didn't have to know about Connor sticking evidence in his mouth.

"There's a kitchen knife over here," she offered. "Most likely the murder weapon."

Just past the knife, there was a blood splatter on the carpet in the hallway, which Connor also went to inspect. This time, he thankfully didn't lick any of it.

"Any sign of a break-in?" Anderson asked.

"Nope. The landlord said the front door was locked from the inside, and all the windows were boarded up. The killer must've gone out the back way."

Anderson had gone back to the body, shining his flashlight over it and higher up, to where the words were printed.

"What do we know about his android?"

Lorna looked to Collins, puzzled. She hadn't thought to ask about any android. It was possible that a guy living in a dump like this couldn't afford one.

"Not much," Collins sighed. "The neighbors confirmed he had one, but it wasn't here when we arrived."

Ben's voice had suddenly taken on a choked tone, and Anderson abandoned staring at the writing on the wall to glance worriedly at his old friend.

"I-I gotta get some air," Collins explained, backing away to the open front door. "Make yourselves at home. I'll be outside if you need me."

Lorna couldn't blame him. The smell was worse than the time she found and opened a 6 month old tub of mashed potatoes that had been left in the back of her family's fridge after Christmas had long since come and passed.

Anderson seemed transfixed by the bloody words, and Lorna didn't find the man particularly helpful anyway, so she stepped carefully through the scene to see where Connor had gone.

He was in the kitchen, eying a bit of broken wall, where the bones of the house poked through. There was blood on the old wooden slats, too.

Lorna was curious. "Can you get a reading just by looking at it?"

"No." Connor waited a moment before turning to look at her. "For that, I have to taste. Or rather, I _ingest_ the material in question - I don't _taste_ in the same way you do, seeing as I don't have to eat to continue living."

She nodded. Would explain why he ate a few crusty bits of dried blood from the murder weapon a moment ago.

Rather suddenly, Connor came to stand very close to Lorna. Her hands sprang from their pockets and she stepped back a pace, but realized he wasn't staring at her anymore. He was examining another, smaller splatter of blood on the doorframe next to her. Which also made her uneasy, so she squeezed past him into the kitchen at large.

"You don't miss much, do you?" She asked him, going to loiter by the counter.

There was a gaggle of beer bottles on the counter, as well as a Gossips Weekly glowing up at her, explaining why sex with androids was better than sex with humans. She swiped and a Tech Addict appeared, with the bold headline, 'IS YOUR ANDROID SPYING ON YOU?'

"My programming is designed to hone in on other things a human might miss, which makes me invaluable to the investigation." He turned on his heel, giving her an unreadable look. His LED was yellow again, just for a moment. "The same way that your skill with firearms lends you to be an indispensable member of our team."

She wanted to tell him to stop researching her, before he found something she didn't want him to. But she wasn't sure that would stop him, and he was moving away from her anyway, examining the upended table and chairs in the middle of the linoleum floor.

Lorna pulled her jacket tighter around her.

"Are you cold?" Connor asked, glancing up from where he'd knelt by one of the rickety wooden chairs.

"Yeah." Her teeth were starting to chatter, almost as if it were colder inside the house than out. She knew that couldn't be possible - it was only that the rain had soaked through her while she'd been talking to Connor, and now she was really feeling the effects of the coming winter as she stood in a brokendown house with no heat on.

It did at least help being further away from Ortiz's body.

Another flash of yellow from Connor's temple. "I could offer you my jacket, in place of your own. It's not dry, but it is larger. And could offer you more warmth."

"No," Lorna said immediately. "Thank you. I'd...prefer to wear my own coat."

"As you wish." Connor's LED stayed yellow as he stared at the chair, but he offered her no indication of his findings as he stood.

"Each letter is perfect," came Anderson's low timbre from the living room. "It's way too neat, no human writes like this."

Lorna went to the doorway again, so that she could see both Anderson and Connor from her position.

Connor inspected two broken windows as Anderson called, "Russo. Was this written in the victim's blood?"

That had to have been obvious. But she really didn't want to get written up for insubordination, especially her first day on the job.

"We think so. But they're taking samples for analysis, to be sure."

On the floor near the refrigerator, Connor found the baseball bat. That was the one missing piece in terms of the evidence. There were fingerprints on the handle, belonging to Ortiz, but no blood or dents anywhere on the shaft.

Connor stayed with the bat for a very long time, glancing every now and then to the knife rack above the sink.

"Red ice," Anderson muttered. "Seems our friend Carlos liked to party."

Officer Miller had entered the living room again, and Anderson addressed him now. "Chris, I want full analysis on these narcotics."

"That isn't what killed him," Lorna dared to say.

Anderson completely ignored her.

Finally abandoning the baseball bat, Connor found the magazine Lorna had been perusing. It was still on the Tech Addict article, until Connor swiped and found himself reading through the article sponsored by Detroit's very own Eden Club, the one on android sex.

Lorna watched him, and Connor looked up at her abruptly, his LED flashing red once before returning to its chilly blue.

He walked brusquely past her, and further down the hall. Stopping at the end, he then vanished into a room Lorna hadn't been in. One that Collins hadn't mentioned to her either.

Her eyebrows furrowed, and she glanced at Anderson before pushing off the wall and hurrying down the corridor to follow Connor. That old man truly wasn't going to be of any help to her. Perhaps their new android friend would.

She traversed the hallway, passing an old cabinet and a broom and mop combo that looked like it had never been used. It was a small bathroom, as dirty as the rest of the house. The light over the sink was on, and the dusty iron radiator stood cold on the far side of the room. The shower, however, Connor opened, revealing dark scribbles on the walls. Written either in Sharpie or some other kind of black marker, the phrase 'rA9' had been obsessively scrawled all over the place.

On the floor of the shower, near the drain, Connor knelt by a totem of some kind.

Lorna took a step closer to see that the totem was a very crude sculpture of a man, though it was difficult to tell what it was made out of. She was hoping Connor would put it in his mouth to see, but though he picked it up and turned it over, he simply placed it back where he'd found it.

"What the fuck is all this?" Lorna shivered.

"A religious offering of some sort?" Connor offered, his LED yellow again.

Lorna quirked a brow. "You think Ortiz was into some kind of cult shit?"

"Perhaps." Connor stared at you for a long moment, and the crime scene photographer's light lit up the hallway outside. "There is one more area of the house I'd like to investigate."

Connor walked past her, to leave the bathroom. He gave no indication for Lorna to follow, but something told her he wanted her to anyway.

All the way back down the hallway, past the photographer and the doorways leading into either the kitchen or living room, Connor pulled open a door at the end.

In the living room, Lorna heard Chris remark that the coroner should have been here a half hour ago. Lorna didn't know if tonight was just an odd night, or if it was possible that no one cared about a dead Latino man in an already doomed, shitty neighborhood.

Past the back door Connor had opened, there was another grated metal door leading out onto the back porch.

He stopped just short of the rain, surveying the yard and leaving Lorna to shiver behind him. Eventually, his gaze came to a halt at a spot just where the porch ended.

Lorna squinted, and saw what Connor saw, though faintly. She never would have seen them had Connor not been there. Footprints.

She gasped. "The front door was locked from the inside, so the killer really did go out this way."

"There are no footprints, apart from Officer Collins' size 10 shoes."

_Goddamit, Chris._

"Well, this happened weeks ago," Lorna said, grasping. "Tracks could've faded."

"No," Connor said matter-of-factly, "this type of soil would have retained a trace." He looked at Lorna, plaintive. "Nobody's been out here for a long time."

Back in the house, Connor lighted on something he must have missed before. Although that couldn't be right - the RK800 didn't seem to miss a thing. It was a pamphlet or advertisement of some sort, on the coffee table that had been shoved to the wall to make room. More likely it was something he hadn't found pertinent until now.

"Come on, guys, get a move on," one of the officers grumbled. "We don't wanna be here all night."

"Neither do we," Lorna told him. She gestured to Connor. "You can't rush him. He's making some good headway."

"A likely story," the officer muttered, trailing away to the other side of the room.

"Why d'you call it a 'he'?" Anderson asked, apropos of nothing. "It's a robot. Say _it_."

Lorna stiffened. "I normally do. But _it's_ our partner, and _it_ has a name. So."

"So?" Anderson challenged her.

" _So_ ," she spat, annoyed. "Some of us don't take pleasure in being an asshole. It's common knowledge that you hate androids, but don't project that onto everyone else. If they can help, then why not let them help? As long as they don't take our jobs."

"Hate to break it to you, sweetheart." Anderson had a smug little grin on his ugly face as he sauntered away. "That _thing_ **is** taking your job."

Lorna realized with a jolt that he was right. If Connor existed, it followed that CyberLife would only be making more RK800's, RK900's, RK1000's, to eventually replace human detectives, to do a better job of solving crimes.

One of the officers nearby snickered, and Lorna shut him up with a cold look. Not wanting to lose her wits her first night on the job, she took a deep breath and tried to exhale her worries.

"What'd you find?" She asked, coming to stand closer to Connor.

"An advertisement, for the Eden Club." He tilted the ad so Lorna could see - a half-naked woman kneeling on the ground, mouth open in a silent moan. One of the trails of the uppercase 'E' ended in a devil's tail, and the headline underneath begged you to 'COME VISIT US.' "Have you ever been there?"

"No." Lorna shook her head, disgusted. Out of all the troubles she had, getting an actual living, breathing human being to have sex with her was not one of them. But when Connor tilted his head and looked curiously at her, she explained, "People go there to have sex with androids. They're like prostitutes, but there's no risk of anyone getting pregnant or contracting an STD, so it's supposed to be safer. It's for people who are lonely, I guess. And...kinda gross."

"I see," Connor said, and left it at that.

He returned to the body, stared fixedly at the writing on the wall. This time, he did again reach out, swiping some of the dried blood off the wall before laying that finger delicately on his tongue.

This time in view of Anderson, who recoiled. "Jesus! What the hell're you doing?"

A bout of loud laughter burst out of Lorna, and she doubled over with the force of it.

"I'm analyzing the blood," Connor explained patiently to the lieutenant. "I can check samples in real time."

Anderson made a horrified face at Lorna. "And you knew about this?"

"That's what he does," Lorna gasped, recovering from her laughter. She swiped at a teary eye with two cold fingers.

"And you didn't find it important to tell me our partner was _eating_ the evidence?"

"I _tried_ to tell you!" As much as she wanted to be pissed off at the old fart, she couldn't bring herself to put any real _oomph_ behind the statement. Connor was watching her with a confused expression, hand still poised halfway to his lips, so she finished with a small, "You ignored me."

Connor turned to address Anderson once more, eyebrows pinched in the most human way. "I'm sorry, I should have warned you."

Anderson looked exasperated as he fidgeted. "Okay, just...don't...put any more evidence in your mouth, you got it?"

"Got it." With two fingers, Connor made a 'shooting gun' gesture at the lieutenant.

He was looking more and more lifelike by the damn second.

Realizing they wouldn't have to wait for the coroner to arrive to find out, Lorna asked, " _Was_ that written in Ortiz's blood?"

"Yes." Then Connor knelt.

Flies buzzed around Ortiz's body, and his eyes stared, glassy, still open.

Connor stood hurriedly, eyes darting around the room at an inhuman pace.

"What're you...?"

"Reconstructing."

Lorna frowned. Was his programming able to reconstruct exactly what happened, or just the best guess? The fact that he could do that at all was mind-blowing. Maybe that's what he'd been doing in the kitchen with the baseball bat as well.

_That thing is taking your job_ , Anderson's voice echoed in her head.

"He was stabbed 28 times," Connor explained, as Anderson came to join them again.

"Yeah," Anderson drawled. "Seems like the killer really had it in for him."

There was an amused smirk on Anderson's face, and it seemed to Lorna that Connor seemed to glare back for a moment. Only a moment, as he then straightened up and spoke. "Lieutenant, I think I've figured out what happened."

"Oh, yeah?" Anderson, of course, sounded like he didn't believe that in the slightest. "Shoot. I'm all ears."

"The victim struck his android with the baseball bat," Connor explained.

"But there were no dents on the bat," Lorna couldn't help but to say. "If Ortiz used that thing to hit an android, there'd definitely be a few dents."

"There _was_ a dent." Connor gave her a light smile. "A small one, invisible to the human eye, just at the apex of the bat."

Lorna sighed, "oh."

And Connor continued, "The android stabbed the victim."

"So the android was trying to defend itself, right?" Again, Anderson sounded like he found it unlikely that an android was capable of disobeying orders.

Which. Normally it was. Not just unlikely, but impossible. Androids were made to follow orders, they didn't just break protocol.

Except there had been that story a few months ago of a PL600 shooting one of its owner's in the face and then taking the owner's daughter hostage on the roof of their apartment building.

"Okay, then what happened?" Anderson continued, giving Connor a chance.

"The victim fled to the living room."

"And tried to get away from the android...all right, that makes sense..."

"The android murdered the victim, with the knife."

"Okay." Anderson waffled. "Your theory's not _totally_ ridiculous, but it doesn't tell us where the android went."

Connor spoke slowly then, programming attempting to piece everything together as his temple glowed yellow. "It was damaged by the bat...and lost some Thirium."

"Lost some what?" Lorna asked.

"Thirium." Those dark eyes were on her again. "You call it 'blue blood.' It's the fluid that powers androids' biocomponents. It evaporates after a few hours and becomes invisible to the naked eye."

"Oh..." Lorna's head twitched, and she remembered how long Connor had taken to inspect the kitchen. "But you can still see it, can't you?"

"Correct."

Gaze cast down to the floor, Connor immediately began tracking the traces of blue blood only visible to him. Into the hallway and down the corridor toward the bathroom, he stopped to examine a spot low on the wall. There were dusty slats there, like a ladder had laid there for quite some time and had only recently been moved.

Above the cabinet from before, Connor stared. There was a latch, and a small door leading to an attic.

His LED was flashing crazy yellow as he came back past Lorna and Anderson to grab a chair from the kitchen.

"Hey, hey, hey!" Anderson stepped forward. "What're you doing with that chair?"

"I'm going to check something."

"Huh..." Anderson sniffed, looking at Lorna. "Gonna _check_ something."

Seriously fed up now, Anderson not realizing just how vital Connor had been to the investigation already, Lorna followed the RK800 halfway down the hall.

Connor placed the chair just below the hatch door, climbed up, and pulled himself into the attic.

For a while, there was only the sound Connor's feet made on the squeaky floorboards as he went. Lorna kept track of his movements on the ceiling, creeping along with him back toward the living room.

There was a sudden scurrying from above, footsteps headed toward the kitchen.

"Connor?" Lorna called, but there was no answer.

After a moment, Anderson also called to the android. "Connor, what the fuck is going on up there?"

A few seconds ticked by. Nothing.

Then, "It's here, Lieutenant!"

"Holy shit..." Anderson muttered.

Lorna's hand went immediately to the pistol at her waist, pulling it from its holster as she charged for the chair standing in the middle of the hallway.

Something stopped her, and that _something_ was Lieutenant Anderson's hand closing around the hood of her jacket, pulling her back.

"What the --"

"Chris, Ben, get your asses in here now!" Anderson started hauling Lorna back toward the kitchen, her heels squeaking wetly on the floor as she struggled.

"Let go! Why can't I --"

"I'll be damned if I let a rookie discharge her weapon her first night _training_ ," Anderson growled, as Officers Miller and Collins marched in from the living room.

Lorna snarled like a rabid dog. "I'm _still_ a police officer! I'm not gonna sit here and do nothing just because you don't want to do some fucking paperwork!"

But Anderson was a big guy, and he was barring her way out from the kitchen, so she stood with her gun in hand, blood rushing, as Chris and Ben entered the attic.

There was no scuffle, no struggle, and the two officers were able to bring the android down in handcuffs.

She had never seen an android look like that - an HK400 model, and not only was its black and white uniform covered in blood, one arm torn to shreds with the wires poking out, its LED circling redredred. But it looked _terrified_ , eyes darting this way and that, flinching when it saw the gun in Lorna's hand.

"Put that fuckin' thing away," Anderson hissed at her.

Lorna did as told, and Ben, Chris, and Hank continued to the front door with the android in tow. She swayed where she stood, glancing up to the attic door.

"Connor?" She called softly, and not a moment later Connor was lowering himself through the opening, climbing down off the chair and fixing the cuffs of his jacket, straightening his tie. "Are you okay?"

It was a knee-jerk reaction, to ask something like that.

"Yes." Connor gave a tiny nod. "Even had I been attacked, androids do not feel pain."

"I mean, yeah, but." But what? "I'm just...glad you're okay, I guess."

Connor's LED went yellow, then blue. He smiled, though it seemed forced. "Thank you, Officer Russo. I appreciate the concern. We can vacate the premises now, and travel to the precinct. The interrogation should take place as swiftly as possible.”

Lorna nodded, and she and Connor went back through the house, past dead old Carlos Ortiz with his 28 stab wounds, and back out into the rain.

The patrol car escorting Ortiz's android to the station was just peeling away from the curb, and the detectives were also climbing into their respective vehicles. The reporters were dispersing, grumbling about the 'typical DPD' and their lack of willingness to hand out information to the media.

Lorna rolled her eyes and continued to her car; she’d parked two blocks down, so she could take her Doxepin in peace. Too bad they'd worn off by the time Anderson got there, although she’d gotten through the night in one piece.

Half of it at least. Now all that was left was to pry a confession out of Ortiz’s android.


	2. Chapter 2

**NOVEMBER 6TH, 2038  
**12:30 AM

It was 12:30 by the time Lorna entered the viewing side of the interrogation room, catching her reflection in the door before it opened. Blonde hair still pinned into a low bun, but frizzy from all the rain, dark circles starting to form under blue eyes, that telltale clench in her jaw. She’d stopped quickly to pour herself a coffee from the break area and the Styrofoam cup shook in her grasp.

The biometric scanner admitted her and she was met immediately with a smirk on the meanest face at the precinct, crossed arms from a man leaning against the opposite wall.

“What’s up, Don Corleone?” His typical nickname for her.

“The fuck is he doing here?” Lorna pointed an accusing finger at Gavin Reed, another detective with the force, but one that Lorna didn’t get along with. And not a very good one, in her opinion. But in her opinion, Gavin wasn’t good at anything.

He had light brown hair, dark brows, a big head (literally and figuratively), and an ugly scar right across the bridge of his nose.

Anderson stepped between them. “Calm down, you two. I’m heading in there, and I don’t want you fighting like cats and dogs while I’m gone.”

Lorna rolled her eyes. “There is literally _no reason_ for him to be in here.”

“Except to stop you from starting an illegal arms trade,” Gavin muttered.

“That wasn’t even clever.”

“Reed’s a detective, same as us, Russo.” Heading for the door, Anderson clapped a hand on Lorna’s shoulder, which she shrugged off. “Now, _behave_.”

With Anderson gone, Lorna did her best to ignore Reed leaning against the wall, deposited her coffee on the desk and laid her jacket on the back of the only chair in the room.

Connor was there, and she had hardly noticed him as he carefully watched what was happening before him.

Through the two-way, the HK400 sat with its bloody, cuffed hands on the metal table, head down. It didn’t look up even when Anderson entered.

Reed shifted. “This is gonna be fuckin’ entertaining.”

Though Lorna agreed, she would never give him the satisfaction and continued to ignore him, sipping at her coffee. Hopefully it would keep her going for as long as she needed it to.

She could feel Connor standing behind her like a pillar.

Hank laid the manila folder he’d brought in with him on the table, but didn’t open it as he took a seat opposite the android. He started with, “You killed Carlos Ortiz,” which was a good tactic.

When the android didn’t respond, or move, or do anything at all really, Anderson continued, “Why’d you kill him? What happened before you took that knife?”

Lorna clenched her jaw as Anderson glanced toward the mirror.

He looked back at the android and asked, “How long were you in the attic?”

Nothing.

“Why didn’t you even try to run away?”

Not even a peep.

“Jesus Christ,” Lorna muttered.

Reed shook his head. “We should just demolish it. Not gonna get anything out of it anyway.”

Connor started with, “I can –“

“Ain’t no one talkin’ to you, tin man,” Reed spat.

Lorna glared at him. “Shut the fuck up, Reed. Let him –“

But then Anderson was leaning forward, snapping his fingers right under the android’s nose, and all three of them were falling silent, waiting for a response. Or a reaction. _Something._

Anderson glanced at the mirror, then back, then raised his arms suddenly and brought them down hard enough on the metal table to make Lorna jump. “Say something, goddamit!”

Reed sniggered at her, but the laughter trickled away as someone laid a hand on her shoulder.

At first she thought it was Reed, and was prepared to break one of his fingers and tell him never to touch her again or she’d break something else too.

But as she turned, she found it was Connor. Just Connor, with his wide brown eyes and sweet smile.

Lorna couldn’t help but to smile back, and lost the rest of the one-sided conversation until Hank was stepping back into the viewing area and Connor’s hand was slipping from her shoulder.

“We’re wastin’ our time interrogating a machine,” he pointed out needlessly. “We’re getting nothing out of it.”

“Could always try roughing it up a little.” That, of course, came from Gavin. “After all, it’s not human…”

Connor spoke, this time without interruption. “Androids don’t feel pain. You would only damage it. And that wouldn’t make it talk. Deviants also have a tendency to self-destruct when they’re in stressful situations.”

Reed shoved off from the wall. “Okay, smartass.” He looked Lorna up and down in that way she hated, then turned his glare back on Connor. “What should we do, then?”

It was obvious Connor wanted to say something, and Lorna felt bad for being the one to interrupt him this time. But she had to try.

“Can I?” She asked, gazing at Anderson, hoping he’d take mercy on her and at least let her get some actual experience in. In all her time bringing perps in, she had yet to actually interrogate or question any of them.

Reed seemed to think this idea funny, but Anderson at least considered it, gaze locked with hers. Then he sighed, shook his head, ran a hand across a sweaty brow. “Captain would never allow it. You’re still in training.”

“Then what?” Lorna shrugged, disappointed.

“I could try questioning it,” Connor said.

If Reed thought Lorna interrogating their attacker was funny, he found the idea of Connor questioning it fucking hilarious. He laughed loudly, and that was it.

“What do we have to lose?” Lorna voiced her thought aloud, still looking at Anderson. He wasn’t making any headway, and she doubted any other human would either.

The old man ground his teeth at her before waving his hand in a motion that clearly meant _yeah, sure, whatever_ , or some combination of the three.

“Go ahead,” Lorna told Connor, now excited for him to get in there and show Gavin what he could do. “Suspect’s all yours.”

She expected Connor to give her another one of his disarming smiles, but his expression stayed neutral as he went to the door. He placed his palm on the scanner and the skin on his hand receded to reveal a smooth, white material, dark joints shifting around where his knuckles had been. That quick, his hand was back to normal and the door was closing behind him.

Lorna had never seen that before, though she supposed it made sense. No fingerprints meant androids would have to access the scanner in a different way. But she wondered why she’d never noticed any of the android officers doing that at the scanners around the station. Her only guess was that she didn’t pay nearly as much attention to them as she did to Connor.

Then Connor was in the adjacent room, his back to them as he flipped through the manila folder holding the case files.

“This oughta be fun,” Reed chuckled.

“Seriously, do you ever shut up?” Lorna asked him.

“Down, girl,” Anderson growled at her, and Reed laughed again.

Lorna clenched her jaw harder and took a steaming sip of coffee.

Connor had taken a seat across from the deviant. “My name is Connor,” he started, and Lorna half-expected him to give his usual spiel about CyberLife. Instead, he asked, “What about you, what’s your name?”

This _was_ going to be interesting, it seemed. Far more interesting than watching Hank yell himself hoarse for no good reason.

The deviant still said nothing, though. Didn’t even move, or pretend to breathe like androids normally did.

Connor squinted. “I detect an instability in your program. It can trigger an unpleasant feeling, like fear in humans.”

Lorna shook her head. “It’s still not saying anything.”

“It’s wasting our fucking time,” Reed sighed, though it wasn’t apparent whether he meant Connor or the deviant.

“I’m not going to hurt you.” Connor pitched his voice low, shaking his head and leaning in toward the other android. “I just need to ask you some questions, so we can understand what happened.”

As though he understood that trying to be this thing’s friend wasn’t going to get him anywhere, he suddenly shifted gears. His voice raised, and he brought his hands down on the table, though nowhere near as hard as Anderson had. “You don’t seem to understand the situation. You killed a human. They’ll tear you apart if you don’t say something.”

 _Holy shit,_ Lorna thought. Even Anderson looked a little shocked from where he was standing.

“If you won’t talk,” Connor continued, “I’m going to have to probe your memory.”

Finally, the android lifted its head, shouted, “No!”

Lorna jumped again, but this time Connor wasn’t there to calm her.

The deviant looked as scared as it had back at the house, it was even shivering. Its lips quivered and its hands clenched on the tabletop. “No, please don’t do that!” Its voice trembled from the force of its shaking, which didn’t make sense. Androids’ voice boxes and the processors that controlled all motor functions weren’t connected.

Suddenly, the deviant looked at the two-way, as though it could see them through it.

Anderson gulped, Lorna’s heart skipped a beat, and Reed muttered, “The fuck…?”

The deviant’s head swiveled slowly back to Connor. “What…what are they gonna do to me?”

Connor didn’t answer right away, and the deviant lighted on something that tipped it over the edge from scared into fucking shitless. “They’re gonna destroy me, aren’t they?”

Connor opted to tell the truth, which was, “They’re going to disassemble you to look for problems in your biocomponents. They have no choice if they want to understand what happened.”

“Why did you tell them you found me?” The deviant asked, sounding hurt. Or betrayed. “Why couldn’t you just have left me there?”

Lorna looked at Connor, feeling…bad for him. This thing had expected – perhaps still expected - Connor to act out of some kind of camaraderie with another android. But Connor worked for the DPD and had a job to do. And he said as much.

“I was programmed to hunt deviants like you. I just accomplished my mission.”

The ice in Connor’s voice was, frankly, a little scary.

There was a beat, and then the deviant gasped, “I don’t wanna die.”

“Then talk to me.”

“I…”

“Fuck, are we really getting somewhere?” Anderson piped up, and Lorna waved her hand to tell him to shut up.

“I can’t…”

“Yes, you can, you stupid robot,” Reed growled. “Lieutenant, just let me go in there. I’ll have that thing talking in two minutes flat.”

Lorna shook her head. “If you go in there and that thing self-destructs, we’re gonna have a _much_ bigger problem on our hands.”

“If you don’t talk,” Connor warned, “they’re going to tear you apart and analyze you piece by piece. They’re going to destroy you, do you understand?”

He leaned back, arms wide. “Okay, then. Don’t talk. Why do I care, after all? I mean, I’m not the one accused of murder, right?”

_Holy hell, Connor._

“If you remain silent, there is nothing I can do to help you. They’re gonna shut you down for good! You’ll be dead! Do you hear me? _Dead!_ ”

The RK800’s voice had suddenly taken on a much different tone, one that worried Lorna.

She stood, poised for the door. “Should we –?”

But Anderson grabbed her wrist, voice even. “Wait.”

A moment later, the deviant started talking again. Its voice was despondent, lost. “He tortured me every day. I did whatever he told me, but…there was always something wrong. Then one day he took a bat and started hitting me. For the first time, I felt…scared.” There it was. “Scared he might destroy me, scared I might die. So I…grabbed the knife and I stabbed him in the stomach. I felt better…so I stabbed him again, and again. Until he collapsed. There was blood everywhere…”

“How do we know it’s not lying?” Reed asked, which was a valid question.

“Why would it lie if it knows Connor will just probe its memory?” Lorna reminded him.

Connor, who had been sitting and listening patiently until now, leaned forward once more. “Why did you write ‘I AM ALIVE’ on the wall?”

“He used to tell me I was nothing, that I was just a piece of plastic.” That obviously upset it, or pissed it off, as it was leaning in to match Connor’s movements, its voice desperate. “I had to write it, to tell him he was wrong.”

“The sculpture, in the bathroom, you made it, right? What does it represent?”

“Sculpture?” Anderson turned to Lorna. “You know about this?”

Lorna waved a hand to keep him silent. This was the part she was really curious about.

“It’s an offering. An offering so I’ll be saved…”

This whole thing officially made less sense than when they started.

“rA9,” Connor probed. “It was written on the bathroom wall. What does it mean?”

Anderson coughed. “rA9? Russo, what the fuck is this bullshit?”

“Be quiet,” she hissed. “I’ll tell you later.”

Looking like he wanted to chew her out, but knowing the interrogation was more important right now, Anderson glared at the two-way.

“The day shall come,” the deviant murmured, “when we will no longer be slaves. No more threats, no more humiliation. _We_ will be the masters.”

Lorna didn’t know if it was reciting something it had heard, or if it was speaking directly to Connor. And though she didn’t _want_ to think about it, she would have to start doing so if she really wanted to be a detective.

“The sculpture was an offering. An offering to whom?”

“To rA9,” the deviant said, as though that should be obvious by now. “Only rA9 can save us.”

“Who _is_ rA9?”

No answer, so Connor backtracked a bit. “When did you start feeling emotion?”

“Before, he used to beat me and I never said anything… But one day I realized it wasn’t… _fair_!” It spit the word out. “I felt anger, hatred. And then I knew what I had to do.”

“Why did you hide in the attic instead of running away?”

“I didn’t know what to do. For the first time, there was no one there to tell me…” The deviant broke off, reiterating, “I was scared. So I hid.”

Silence stretched between the two androids.

Connor turned slowly back to the mirror. “I’m done.” He rose from his seat and the HK400 let him go.

“Fuck, he actually did it,” Lorna muttered, grabbing her coffee and jacket and following Anderson and Reed into the hallway.

“I’m as surprised as you, toots,” Reed tossed at her, fetching Officer Miller to come and take the deviant away.

The station was half-dead at this hour, save for some regulars hollering from the drunk tank.

“What is this about a statue and _rA9_?” Anderson asked, pulling Lorna aside.

“To be fair, if you had read the case notes, you’d have seen that.”

“ _To be fair_ ,” Anderson mocked like a child, “you’d better just tell me.”

“In the bathroom, Connor found –“

Lorna broke off upon hearing some sort of commotion coming from the interrogation room. She peered in to see Chris struggling with the deviant, which was resisting standing from its chair.

“Don’t touch me,” it choked, flinching away from Miller’s grasp.

“The fuck’re you doing?” Reed snarled. “Move it!”

“ _Okay_ ,” Miller tried to placate the man before moving back in. “Come now. Don’t be difficult, it’ll only make things harder.”

“No!” The deviant said through clenched teeth, and then again, “don’t touch me.”

Lorna sighed, moved to set her things down to try and help. But Anderson barred her with an arm across her chest.

“What –“

“Chris,” Reed sighed, “you gonna move this asshole or what?”

“You shouldn’t touch it,” Connor said. “It’ll self-destruct if it feels threatened.”

Reed was obviously reaching his boiling point, which didn’t take much these days. He stepped toward Connor with a threatening gesture. “Stay outta this, got it? No fuckin’ android is gonna tell me what to do.”

“You don’t understand.” Connor surprised them all by fighting back, which Lorna realized was technically against his protocol. “If it self-destructs, we won’t get anything out of it.”

“I told you to shut your fucking mouth! Chris, are you gonna move this asshole?”

“I’m trying!” Miller was still locked in a struggle with the deviant, which wasn’t fighting back per se, but was refusing to budge an inch.

“I can’t let you do that,” Connor ordered, stepping suddenly past Reed and pulling at Officer Miller’s arm. “Leave it alone, now!”

Lorna bucked against Hank’s arm. “Connor –“

She knew Reed. He wouldn’t hesitate, especially with an android.

And he didn’t, shoving Chris out of the way and drawing his gun in Connor’s face in under a second. “I warned you, motherfucker.”

“That’s enough!” Anderson barked.

But Reed didn’t back down. “Mind your own business, Hank.”

If Hank wasn’t going to do anything, then Lorna would.

Dropping her jacket and coffee, the still-scalding liquid splashed up along Anderson’s pant leg and he was distracted with a yelp long enough for her to duck under his arm and draw her own pistol. She kept it trained on Reed’s head. “He said that’s enough, Reed. Or are you too stupid to even follow orders?”

For a very long moment, no one did or said anything. Not even Hank, who she thought was going to yell at her again for discharging her weapon.

Connor’s wide brown eyes flitted between Lorna and Gavin and back.

Finally Lorna murmured, “I’m a better shot than you, Reed.”

He knew it, too, because he was growling, “Fuck!” and lowering his gun. He pointed at Hank. “You’re not gonna get away with it this time.” He glared once more at Connor before shoving past Lorna, who kept her pistol trained on him on his way out the door.

Connor turned immediately back to the deviant, which had crouched itself on the floor. “Everything is all right. It’s over now.” Connor’s voice was gentle, reassuring. “Nobody’s gonna hurt you.” He asked Miller not to touch it. “Let it follow you out of the room and it won’t cause any trouble.”

Lorna didn’t know how Connor knew that for certain, but as she watched the deviant did climb slowly to its feet and follow Chris from the room, fast on his heels. When it passed her, she noticed burn marks on its forearms, small and circular, as though a cigarette had been repeatedly snuffed out on its skin.

Glancing down at Anderson’s wet pants, Lorna stooped to grab her jacket and the empty cup. “Fuck, sorry. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” He did sound it, but he also poked an insistent finger at her shoulder. “You _tell_ me about new evidence when it crops up, Russo.”

“I’ll tell you about new evidence if you start letting me make myself useful.”

“Deal.”

It didn’t sound grudging at least, and Hank vacated the room, leaving Lorna alone with Connor again.

She almost asked if he was okay, but caught herself. “You did really well, Connor. With the interrogation.”

“Thank you, Officer Russo.” She expected him to talk more, elaborate a little on what had happened, but he simply walked past her and into the hallway.

Lorna glanced down at the puddle of coffee as she left, hoping a night shift janitor would be by soon.

She almost walked right into Connor as she rounded the corner out of the room. He wasn’t moving, and was effectively barring Lorna's path to the rest of the station.

"Connor?"

"I'm sorry." Connor stared, dark eyes burning two holes right through her. "There are a few questions I'd like to ask you, if you have the time."

Thinking, Lorna grabbed her phone once more to check the time. Almost 2 now. And she had to be back down here again tomorrow. "It's kinda late..."

Connor's face visibly fell, and Lorna knew she didn't have to feel bad, but considering Connor was so lifelike she did anyway.

"How about you come to my place?" She offered, reaching to cup a hand at Connor's elbow. "You can ask your questions while I get ready for bed."

Connor's gaze followed Lorna's hand to his arm, and stayed there for a moment. His LED didn't change from its usual blue, but he did blink in quick succession before catching her gaze again. "I'd like that."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> still a mess and un-beta'd rip pls enjoy


	3. Chapter 3

**NOVEMBER 6TH, 2038  
**2:00 AM

It was still raining as they were leaving.

In the parking lot, Anderson stood talking to Collins, who was also finally getting ready to head home. Lorna waved, called, "Bye, Ben! See you tomorrow!"

Ben waved back, said goodbye, and Anderson frowned at her. "Where're you going with that thing?"

Lorna didn't answer, just gave Anderson the finger and turned back around to continue to her car alongside Connor.

Behind them, Anderson of course began to gripe, but Lorna was concentrating on Connor's left hand, which was starting to curl its fingers in toward his palm, middle finger staying pointed. "What is this?" The android asked.

"Don't do that," Lorna giggled, closing her hand around Connor's. But _God_ , was his skin soft. Not technically skin, though. What kind of material was an android's skin made out of?

She was on the opposite side of Connor from his LED, but she could see the realization dawn on his face as he presumably looked up what raising your middle finger at someone meant. " _Oh._ "

Lorna expected him to ask why she'd done that, but he didn't. Anyone – even an android - with two brain cells to rub together could assume why someone would give Hank Anderson the finger.

In the car, a silver Lexus self-drive, Lorna placed her hand on the scanner and the engine rumbled to life.

A clear, high voice echoed from the speakers, asking where she'd be heading.

"Home."

Slowly, the car pulled out of the lot and onto the street.

Connor's eyes darted around as Lorna placed her hands on the vents to warm them. He glanced into the back seat, but there was nothing back there save for the remnants of the burger she'd downed on her way to the scene.

In the front seat, however, there was an umbrella at Connor's feet that Lorna hardly ever used, and in the center console were the bottle of pills she'd completely forgotten about.

Grabbing for them a little too late, she stuffed them in her pocket as Connor's LED turned yellow and he asked, "Do you have trouble sleeping?"

"Oh, yeah," Lorna lied. "It's pretty bad."

"You should be on Estazolam. Doxepin helps you stay asleep, but Estazolam is the best medicine on the market for helping you fall asleep. I can order some for you, if you'd like."

Lorna held a hand up, already falling too deep into yet another lie. "That's okay, Connor. I'll look into it and have Noah order some."

"Who is Noah?"

"My android. I guess you'll be meeting him soon."

The rest of the drive was spent in silence, and though Lorna was dying to tell Connor to just ask his questions on the way there, so she could sleep as soon as possible, she didn't want to disturb him. He seemed mesmerized watching the buildings and lights speeding by, the rain streaking the windows even harder as they hit the highway.

"How much farther?" He asked, as they hit the stretch of road to her apartment complex. His tone wasn't impatient, just curious.

"I'm actually just up here on the right."

"This is the Oakland district, one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in Detroit. You must make a high salary."

"Um. Yeah."

The wage for a Detroit City police officer wasn't abysmal, but there was no way she could afford to live in Oakland off of that alone. She would make more once she was officially a detective and until then, her parents were happy enough to front the rent for her apartment.

An apartment on the 68th floor, a heavy metal door that gave way to a sprawling floor plan and floor to ceiling windows through which you could see the entirety of downtown Detroit, twinkling through the rain.

The lights flickered on as they entered, and a young man with dark hair and a purple uniform came around the kitchen island toward them.

"Welcome home, Lorna," the young man chirped. "The time is 2:17 AM. I've just fed Igby, Luke stopped by at 12:30 AM, and your supper, prepared at 11:03 PM, is in the refrigerator. Would you like me to reheat it for you?"

"That's okay. I'll do it," Lorna heaved, glad to be home. She handed Noah her jacket and he hung it on the coat rack by the door as she toed her shoes off. "Can you take Connor's coat?"

"That won't be necessary." Connor held a hand up to stop Noah's advance toward him. He stayed by the door, however, looking the other android up and down. "This is an AP700 model, one of CyberLife's newest. You must make a _very_ high salary."

"My parents got him for me about a month ago, an early Christmas present." That she at least didn't have to lie about.

A plump black and white cat made an appearance from the bedroom, but instead of coming to greet Lorna as he usually did, he trotted to the door to investigate. His bushy tail twined around Connor's pant leg as he meowed loudly.

"He doesn't have your food, fatass," Lorna muttered, heading to the fridge to retrieve her own plate of food. Noah had made pork chops and mashed potatoes, one of her favorites. To Connor, she announced, "His name is Igby. My pride and joy."

"He's cute," Connor seemed to decide, and stooped to scratch Igby behind one white ear. "I like cats."

The cat started purring like a motorboat, and Connor immediately stepped back, looking like he'd changed his mind.

"He's purring," Lorna offered, popping her food in the large, industrial microwave above the stove. Igby hopped onto a stool and then onto the island, giving another blaring meow in Connor's direction. "He wants you to pet him again. Are you sure you don't want Noah to take your jacket?"

Connor was practically leaking onto the nice laminated wood flooring.

"Yes, I --"

"You're dripping all over the floor," Lorna said as nicely as she could, and the microwave beeped, signaling that her food was done. Thing could cook whole meals in a matter of minutes, too.

"I'm so sorry," Connor said, finally whipping his jacket off and handing it to Noah. All of the glowing bits went dark as he did. "It's nice to meet you, Noah. I'm Connor, I'm the android sent by CyberLife."

Noah looked as though he didn't know what to make of this information, because he probably didn't. He turned to Lorna and smiled. "Shall I dim the lights in the bedroom?"

"No!" Lorna choked on a bit of pork chop, and Noah was at her side in a minute, but she shoved the android away and took a breath. "No, I...that's not necessary, Noah. You can...you can take a load off."

The AP700 nodded, strode to his charging station by the sofa, and closed his eyes.

Looking as confused as Noah had, Connor approached Igby on the island and offered his hand for the cat to rub his face against.

"So." Best to charge right ahead and leave no room for Connor to ask any awkward questions, save for the ones he already had in mind. "What'd you have to ask?"

Connor's expression cleared and he abandoned Igby to come and stand closer to Lorna, for whatever reason. His gaze was penetrating, especially after having spent all night in relative darkness with the android. In the bright light of her apartment, it was like she couldn't hide from him.

"Was I of assistance to you tonight, in terms of helping with the crime scene?"

"Of course." Lorna frowned, chewing. "Without you, we would never have even known Ortiz's android was still in the attic. We wouldn't have known an android committed the crime at all. You basically solved that all on your own. And the interrogation. I mean, no one else could’ve cracked that android. We’d still be sitting there it if weren’t for you."

Saying all this, she came to the realization of how truly useless she and Anderson had been all night. Although she had to give herself a little credit - at least she'd been there on time.

Connor's LED looped on yellow. "And was I of assistance to you personally tonight, in terms of helping Lieutenant Anderson with your training?"

"Again, of course. I think you helped more than he did, to be honest."

A moment passed, and Connor beamed. His LED turned blue again. "Thank you, Officer Russo. Your answers have been logged with CyberLife. I'm very happy to hear that I've been of help."

Lorna took a swig of lemonade and watched Igby bounce along the counter to find Connor again, rubbing at the android's elbow, the one she'd touched earlier. "Why did CyberLife assign you to this case in particular?"

Connor glanced down at Igby, and then back up, gliding a hand smoothly along the cat's back. "We're investigating deviants and deviant behavior. Who better to catch androids than another android?"

“But we didn’t _know_ an android killed Ortiz beforehand.”

“CyberLife suspected.”

Lorna frowned. “Shouldn’t Anderson have been told that before he showed up?”

Connor thought about this, finally saying, “CyberLife didn’t deem this information pertinent. If it had been found that another human perpetrated the crime, instead of an android, we simply would have been assigned to another case.”

She supposed that added up, but there was still something missing. It would take a while for her to figure out what, though, so instead of pressing she just grinned at Connor and nodded at Igby. "He's in heaven."

The cat had flopped onto the island and was rolling about, spraying fur everywhere. Lorna moved her plate a little further away, and was surprised when Connor followed her.

"You're curious as to why I was created in the first place?"

"...kind of," Lorna answered hesitantly. She ground her heel against the floor, sock squeaking.

Outside, the storm picked up again, sending sheets of rain against the windows.

"The violent crime rate in Detroit is the second highest in the nation after St. Louis and roughly ten times the average rate of most other suburban counties. The DPD does a fantastic --" Connor seemed to correct himself as he spoke, gaze casting down for just a moment "-- an _admirable_ job of attempting to keep crime under control. As you know, there's already a force of android police officers, but I am the first android _detective_ of my kind. I'm merely a prototype, meant to aid you and the lieutenant, and to gather information. Does that more accurately answer your question?"

"I...guess it does. Thank you, Connor."

"You're welcome, Officer Russo."

"Lorna. Please."

Connor tilted his head on a small nod. "Lorna."

Down to the last few bits of her mashed potatoes, she sat under Connor's calculating gaze. He had braced both hands on the lip of the island, his white dress shirt clinging to his chest. His tie was slightly askew before he fixed it with a shimmy.

"I had one more question for you, Lorna. About deviancy."

She didn't know how helpful she'd be in that department, but she'd at least try. "Shoot."

"How much do you know about deviant androids?"

"Honestly, not much. I've never even seen a malfunctioning android before. All the androids my family has had have operated perfectly, and so has Noah. Not even a glitch in the matrix." Realizing Connor had no idea what that reference meant, she smiled. "It's a movie."

"Ah." Connor blinked. "I have minimal experience myself. I wanted to ask, what do _you_ think makes an android deviant?"

Lorna shook her head and thought. "It has to be a mistake in the code, right? Or a malfunction. But like I said, I've never been in the presence of an android that had even the slightest problem wrong with it. Maybe, now that androids are being mass-produced so quickly, more manufacturers are making mistakes?"

"Possibly." Connor's LED was yellow.

"Logging with CyberLife?"

"No," was all Connor said.

“I am curious, though,” Lorna mused, taking her plate to the sink and running some water over it, leaving it for Noah to put in the dishwasher later. “If androids can’t feel pain, how did it know that Ortiz hurting it was wrong in the first place?”

More yellow at Connor’s temple, and he poised his thumb and forefinger in the most human gesture at his chin. “The deviant said it felt fear, that Ortiz hurting it was ‘unfair.’ Perhaps it didn’t need to feel any pain to understand that what was happening to it was wrong. Do people often mistreat their androids?”

“In the privacy of their own homes, I can’t say. At the station, some of the human officers like to pick on the androids. But it’s more bullying than anything else – no one’s taking a baseball bat to any of them. Although that might just be because they’re afraid of getting caught destroying DPD property.” She bit her lip. “On the street, some people yell at their androids or berate them. But yeah, I’ve never seen anyone do what Ortiz did to that thing, to that extent.”

Lorna remembered the way the android’s wires had poked up out of its arm, the sparks flying through artificial skin. She looked at Connor, who matched her stare. “Have _you_ ever felt fear?”

“How do you mean?”

“Well…did you feel scared when Reed had that gun pointed at your head?”

“No,” Connor answered easily, and when he leaned back against the island (yet another too human gesture), Lorna could see the outline of his chest through his shirt. “Fear is only a human emotion. Any android feeling fear would be considered deviant. What I feel would be more closely equated to…urgency. It allows me to enact a fight or flight response, and choose the best course of action based on the events transpiring.”

Lorna chewed harder at her lip, and Connor’s eyebrows flew up as he remarked, “You were scared.”

“I was?” Lorna queried. “When?”

“When Lieutenant Anderson banged his fists on the table. You flinched, and your heart rate accelerated due to a rush of adrenaline. You calmed only when I touched your shoulder.”

She remembered, the way she’d evened out as Connor’s hand curled over her. He gave off no warmth, but the gesture had been comforting all the same.

“Why did you do that?” She asked, not knowing if she wanted to hear the answer or not.

“Studies show that humans perform better when they are comfortable, or unworried. Studies also show that physical contact can help to lower stress levels. I thought you’d be able to better concentrate on the interrogation if you felt better. Should I not have done that?”

“No, you’re fine, Connor. You helped.”

“Good.” Connor nodded, the collar of his shirt sighing as he did so. Then his eyebrows furrowed, and he crossed his legs. “Why did Detective Reed call you Don Corleone?”

Lorna sighed, gripping the edge of the sink behind her. “It’s…another movie reference,” she only half-lied, and before Connor could delve deeper into her file for a better answer, she quipped, “He’s an asshole. As I’m sure you noticed.”

“He doesn’t seem to like me, presumably because I’m an android. But why doesn’t he like you?”

“He doesn’t like me, and I don’t like him. It’s a long story.” One that she didn’t have time for at the moment, as this was starting to take much more time than she’d thought it would.

Connor made a face that Lorna could only describe as a frown. “Is that why you defended me?”

“Because I don’t like Gavin?” Lorna shrugged. “I would’ve done that for anyone. He had a gun on you, you were in danger.”

“You shouldn’t have done that.” He didn’t sound upset, merely clinical. “I am indispensable. You are not.”

Lorna spread her hands as if to say that she really didn’t care. “I just didn’t want him to hurt you. He was going to shoot _you_ , after all. He wouldn’t have dared to turn his gun on me, not with so many people - and cameras - in the room.”

Connor was not to be placated. “Just for future reference, Lorna. Your life is more valuable than mine.”

That was, she supposed, technically true. Connor could be reset and reissued to them. She only had one life, and she did plan to make it a good one. Still, she wasn’t going to let anyone shoot anyone else, android or not.

“Sure,” she allowed. “Anything else?"

Connor wasted no time. "Who is Luke?"

"My brother." The clock on the microwave read 10 to 3. Lorna yawned.

"It's getting late," Connor observed, and started to move toward the door. "You should sleep."

"You, too," Lorna said without thinking, rubbing at an eye and following Connor to the door. "Wait, where _do_ you go at night?"

"This is my first day on the job. My orders are to go to the precinct for storage until morning, or to report back to CyberLife headquarters." Connor grabbed his jacket and whipped it on.

Igby gave a plaintive little meow from the island, obviously not wanting Connor to go.

"They let you choose?" Lorna asked.

"Yes. I suppose I'll go back to the precinct, since that is where the investigation will recommence tomorrow morning."

Lorna nodded, honestly only a few minutes away from falling asleep.

Connor opened the door and stepped out, and Lorna was about to close it behind him when he turned back, palm pressed gently but firmly to the door. "I have one more question."

She smiled patiently.

"Why did Noah offer to dim the lights in your bedroom when we first arrived?"

Her face flamed - she thought Connor would have forgotten. Damn her for thinking an android would forget anything.

"He, um." She scratched at the side of her nose, and Connor just stared at her. "He thought...like...he assumed we were going to sleep together, I guess."

"You seemed vehemently opposed to the idea."

"I'm not...I mean, you're...it's..." Lorna chewed at her lip again, trying to look anywhere but at Connor's stupid, pleading face. "You're an android."

Connor didn't even blink, just let his hand slip from the door as he nodded. "I see. Goodnight, Lorna."

"Goodnight, Connor."

This time she didn't hesitate, just shut the door in the android's face and slumped against it.

She made sure to grab the bottle of Doxepin from the pocket of her jacket before padding into the bedroom and face planting on the bed. She was asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> connor comes to lorna's apartment and things get *~*spicy*~* okay not rlly bye


	4. Chapter 4

****

**NOVEMBER 6TH, 2038**  
7:00 AM

In the morning, Lorna was woken by the sound of her phone, which had gotten shoved under her pillow as she slept. The ringtone grew louder as she pulled it out, and she grumbled, “Hello?” into the receiver.

“Hello, Offi – Lorna. This is Connor, I’m the android sent by –“

“I know who you are, Connor.”

“Right. It’s 7:01 AM. We spoke until late last night; I thought you could use a wakeup call.”

Lorna made a low noise and rolled over. The rain had dissipated and the early morning sun creeped along her bedspread. Connor was right – if he hadn’t called, she wouldn’t have woken up on time, seeing as she’d neglected to tell Noah to set an alarm before passing out last night.

“How’d you get my number?” She asked, voice scratchy.

“Detective Collins was still at the station when I arrived last night. I asked him.”

“I’m sure his wife loved that,” Lorna mumbled. “Thanks for calling, Connor. It helped.”

There was an obvious grin in Connor’s voice as he chirped, “You’re welcome, Lorna. How did you sleep last night?”

“Fine.” She frowned. “Why d’you –“

Remembering what she’d told him about the sleeping pills, she caught herself and instead said, “Uh, my sleep schedule has actually been a lot more regular these days.”

“You should still look into Estazolam. I think it would greatly improve the number of hours you get of sleep per night.”

Lorna nodded slowly, blonde hair hanging limp in her face. “I’ll think about it. And I’ll see you soon, Connor.”

After she hung up, she took a few minutes to scroll through her phone. A few more reports of deviancy had sprung up overnight, there were some more hits on her latest social media post, and she had a call from Luke, followed by a text asking when she’d be at home for him to stop by.

Considering she was fully stocked on pills for the foreseeable future, probably not any time soon. Ignoring said text, she dragged herself from the bed for a hot shower, a mouthful of Vicodin, and a cup of coffee.

Sitting at the island with Igby munching on his food at her feet, she scooped a forkful of eggs into her mouth as Noah rattled off the chores he wanted to do around the apartment today and the things he wanted to buy or replace.

“Sounds good,” Lorna yawned, the pills in full effect now. “Bill goes straight to Mom.”

Noah nodded, declaring, “All billing to 412 Glen Arm Avenue, Woodbridge, Michigan, care of Olivia Russo.”

Among the list of things Noah wanted to put in orders for were a replacement part for her laptop, and a couple more weight loss toys for Igby seeing as he was getting so fat. Or, as Noah put it, ‘mildly obese.’

Lorna nodded slowly along to this, and then perked up. “Can you message Luke and ask him if he’s ever heard of a sleeping pill called Estazolam? Or if he has any on him?”

Noah’s LED circled yellow once. “Done. Is there another specific task you’d like me to accomplish today, Lorna?”

He was already programmed with his usual duties – making her bed, feeding Igby every couple of hours, making her dinner before she got home. So Lorna shook her head.

“Nope.” She left her plate on the island for Noah to take care of, pet Igby behind the ears, and grabbed her coat from the rack. “Be good, you two.”

She reached the station around 8:10, only ten minutes late. The TV on the wall was tuned to channel 16, where an anchorman was explaining the escalating situation between America and Russia in the Arctic. And already the reception area was full of people waiting to be seen by an officer or detective. One woman sat holding a small, weeping boy close and stroking his hair, and she jolted when she caught sight of the badge dangling from Lorna’s neck.

Lorna, however, averted her gaze and swiped her palm over the scanner beside the glass doors reading ‘RESTRICTED AREA’ and they swung wide to admit her.

She found Connor almost immediately, as she glanced to Anderson’s desk and found him sitting complacently beside it, staring at the wall.

“Connor.”

He lit up upon seeing her, bounding from his chair and coming to take her hand.

“Sorry I’m late,” she apologized. “It takes me a bit to get ready in the morning.”

“No need to apologize. I’ve just been informed that the lieutenant doesn’t often arrive at work before noon. I’m sorry for waking you so early – If I had known he wouldn’t be here until then, you could have gotten another couple hours of sleep.”

An officer at a desk near them, presumably the one who told Connor this, laughed under his breath.

“Right.” She’d forgotten about Hank’s propensity for being a couple hours late each day. “It’s okay. Better to get here and get a head start.”

Glancing up to the large glass-walled office at the apex of the room, she saw Captain Fowler with his head bent low over his desk, catching up on paperwork.

“I’ve already given Lieutenant Anderson a call. His answering machine said I could leave a message, if that’s what ‘turned me on,’ so I did. But he hasn’t gotten back to me as of yet…and I’m not any more _turned on_ than I have been all day. I only have one operating setting.”

Again, the officer nearest them started laughing, but this time he was on the verge of tears.

“Is there a problem?” Lorna quipped, and the man struggled to control his laughter. With a roll of her eyes, she seated herself in Anderson’s chair, much squishier than any of the others around the station. “Whatever. Connor, you can take that desk. No one’s using it.”

She pointed to the desk directly adjacent to Anderson’s, which had been unoccupied since they lost an officer in a drug raid downtown last month.

Hank’s desk was a mess – discarded headphones, a cold cup of coffee that had been sitting out for God knows how long, all the sticky notes and bumper stickers plastered on his white board, most of which contained anti-android slogans. There was a Detroit basketball hat hanging from the corner of the board, and on the glass paneling beside the desk he’d taped a couple newspaper clippings from his time with the red ice task force. He looked nice in these pictures, devoid of his now-signature scowl or any scraggly facial hair.

“I was thinking,” Connor started, as Lorna moved a half-empty box of donuts out of the way so she could log onto Anderson’s terminal with her ID. “The deviant last night showed signs of PTSD after being abused by its owner, as if its original program had been completely replaced by new instructions.”

“You think that’s possible?” Lorna asked, pulling up the deviant case file folder.

“Yes. The question is, _who_ is rewriting the programming? And how?”

Lorna chewed her cheek, scrolling down past the cases she was already familiar with – the one about the PL600 on the roof, the AV500 that reportedly tried to strangle a customer at Fast Coney Dogs. “Maybe the androids themselves are. You guys are pretty advanced technology and –“

“Unlikely,” Connor cut her off. He tilted his head. “Androids are advanced, but rewriting our own programming is impossible. Only the technicians at CyberLife could do that.”

Lorna’s eyebrows rose of their own accord, and she gave Connor a look. “Should we be looking into them, then?”

Connor stared at her, and she could assume he found this idea unlikely as well. He wound up simply shrugging. “If you have any files on deviants, I’d like to take a look at them.”

“You can use the terminal on your desk. I’m doing the same.”

The two newest cases caught her eye. Both had been perpetrated just last night, while Lorna, Hank, and Connor had been busy with Ortiz.

The first took place at Carl Manfred’s house, a famous painter who lived in the county, same neighborhood as Lorna’s parents. The report detailed an altercation between Manfred’s android and his son, one that ended in Manfred’s death and the subsequent destruction of the android.

“Fuck,” Lorna muttered, falling back in her seat.

“What is it?” Connor queried.

Across the desk, she could see that he was browsing the same file. “I knew him. Not personally, but he lived a couple blocks down from my parents. They were kinda friendly with him, and I met his android a few times. His name was Michael or Matthew or something.”

“It’s a shame he passed away. You could have gone to question him.”

Lorna hummed, thinking now more about her parents than about Manfred. It was unlikely that they were involved in the crime, but with them you never knew. In any case, she wouldn’t go down that road until the investigation steered her in that direction.

The second case jumped out at her as well – an AX400 model had purportedly attacked the victim and then fled. The android had recently returned from being repaired and had shown signs of aggression in the past.

For the next few hours, Lorna and Connor pored over various cases, having no idea if they were making any headway or not.

Even Lorna leaned back. Scrubbing a hand down her face, she sighed. “I’m going to get some coffee.”

What she was really itching for wasn’t currently available, so she pushed herself up and out of Anderson’s uncomfortable chair and started for the station kitchen.

Connor’s voice emanated from not far behind her before she was even halfway there. “There are 243 files in the deviancy database.”

Lorna glanced back, making a face. “You _counted_ them?”

“I did a scan. The first of these files dates back nine months. It all started in Detroit…and quickly spread across the country. This AX400, that could be a good starting point for our investigation.”

She agreed, but. “We’ll have to wait and see what Hank says.”

“Got you on kinda a short leash, does he, Don Corleone?”

That voice, as soon as she entered the kitchen, was like nails on a chalkboard. She had been counting on Reed still being home at this hour, considering how late they’d all been up last night. Should have known her luck was never that good.

He was standing at one of the high tops with Tina Chen, another female officer she knew didn’t like her, but one who never had the balls to say it to her face.

“Oh, Reed. You never cease to amaze me. Can’t believe you still think making fun of me will get you laid.” She looked pointedly at Tina, whose face flamed as she glanced down at the table.

Gavin didn’t have any kind of response to that, because he was watching Connor trail into the kitchen behind her. “Shit. Our friend the plastic detective is back in town!”

As Lorna poured her coffee, she hoped Connor would just ignore Reed. But of course Connor had to be polite and approachable – it was in his programming.

“Hello, Detective Reed.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Lorna saw Reed approach Connor with that lazy, swaggering gait. He looked Connor up and down. “Never seen an android like you before. What model are you?”

“It’s right there on his jacket, retard,” Lorna laughed.

Still, “RK800,” Connor supplied. “I’m a prototype.”

“A prototype?” Reed asked, like it was the most interesting information in the world. Lorna finished dumping cream and sugar into her coffee just in time to turn and see Reed addressing Tina again. “Android detective. So machines are gonna replace us all, is that it?”

Connor glanced at Lorna, but Lorna didn’t have an answer. She was looking through Connor and thinking, again, about what Anderson had said last night.

“Hey,” Reed continued, “bring me a coffee, dipshit.”

She broke from her reverie, assuming Gavin was talking to her. But when Connor just stood there, he shouted, “Get a move on!”

“Jesus, Reed,” Lorna started to complain, assuming Connor would obey. He was, after all, under the jurisdiction of the DPD – certainly any officer could give him orders.

But Connor surprised her, and obviously Reed as well, by saying, “I’m sorry, but I only take orders from Lieutenant Anderson.”

“Oh,” Reed sighed, and backed away. For a minute Lorna really thought he’d let it go.

Instead he stepped back in and swung his fist at Connor, who caught it in the stomach and immediately doubled over.

“What the fuck?” Coffee abandoned on the counter, Lorna strode quickly over and got a fistful of the front of Gavin’s shirt, pushing him back.

He stumbled, but recovered easily, knocking Lorna’s hand away and pointing a finger down at Connor’s crumpled form. “If you hadn’t gotten in the way yesterday, I would’ve fucked it up for disobeying a human.”

“Well, I did,” Lorna said forcefully, holding her ground between Connor and Reed. She placed a hand on her holster. “And I can do it again.”

Tina had backed into the corner, holding her hands over her mouth and trembling.

Reed glared at Lorna for a long moment, and Lorna glowered back. Then he spoke to Connor. “Stay outta my way. Because next time, she might not be around to defend you.”

He left with a motion for Tina to follow.

Once they were gone, Lorna pushed her hair out of her face. “Fuck.” She turned to help Connor up, cupping a hand around one elbow as the other braced at his shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” Connor assured her. Did she imagine that he sounded out of breath? “Androids don’t feel pain.”

“I _know_ , I just –“

“He struck my Thirium regulator. But I don’t think he damaged it; I was built to withstand moderate to severe blows.”

Almost as if she could tell, Lorna cupped her hand over Connor’s stomach.

Connor stared down at her, and did she also imagine that his gaze flitted once to her lips and then back up? He laid a hand gently on her forearm and smiled. “I’m okay, Lorna. But you shouldn’t be putting yourself in harm’s way for me, remember?”

Lorna did remember, but she shook her head. She and Connor were in a tighter embrace than she’d been in in months. “ _No_ , Connor. I’m not going to just let him do whatever he wants to you. He gets away with enough already.”

Connor slid his hand up to her elbow, and she shivered. “Are you cold?”

“No.” She left it at that, and Connor pursed his lips.

A lock of his usually-neat hair had fallen onto his forehead and Lorna lifted a hand to push it back into place. Even his hair was soft.

Confusion plain on his face, Connor’s gaze roamed over her. “…shall we return to wait for Lieutenant Anderson?”

On their way back to the desks, Lorna’s coffee in hand, Hank finally stumbled in.

“Where the fuck have you been?” Lorna growled, already in a foul mood thanks to Reed. She took a seat in Hank’s chair again.

He reeked of booze, and it wasn’t even 12:00 yet.

Connor counteracted Lorna’s attitude with a giant grin. “It’s good to see you again, Lieutenant.”

“Jesus,” Hank muttered, taking the back of his chair and dumping Lorna out of it. “Don’t get too comfortable, Fowler saw me coming in and he’s about to ream our asses out.”

“For what?” Lorna grimaced, gaining her footing.

It was at that moment, though, that Captain Fowler did actually make an appearance, shouting, “Hank! Lorna! My office!”

“I’ve been here for a few hours already,” Lorna whispered, trailing closely behind Hank with Connor on her heels. “Why didn’t he just call me in?”

“Because I’m responsible for you,” Hank grunted, and the three of them filed into Fowler’s office.

Lorna and Hank took seats at the two chairs available, and Connor stood behind them.

The Captain was a hardened officer of some 30+ years on the force, but he and Lorna had always had a professional relationship, if not an altogether _good_ one. He had been the last say on whether Lorna got hired on out of basic training, despite who her family was.

He kept them waiting for a few seconds, Lorna fidgeting in her seat, before speaking.

“I’ve got ten new cases involving androids on my desk every day. We’ve always had isolated incidents, old ladies losing their android maids and that kind of crap. But now, we’re getting reports of assaults and even homicides, like that guy last night. This isn’t just CyberLife’s problem anymore. It’s now a criminal investigation and we’ve gotta deal with it before the shit hits the fan.”

Was that it? He just wanted them to work a little faster, a little harder? Lorna didn’t see a problem with that. If Fowler was worried about Hank always showing up to work late, drunk, or a combination of the two, he didn’t say anything.

Lorna nodded, but Hank of course had to ruin it.

“Why me?” He groused, and she wasn’t sure if he was asking why he was being tasked with deviant cases, or why he had to train Lorna, or even why he had to deal with an android partner in Connor.

She just wished he hadn’t.

“Why do I gotta be the one to deal with this shit?” Hank went on. “I am the least qualified cop in the country to handle this case! I know jack shit about androids, Jeffrey! I can barely change the settings on my own phone.”

“Everybody’s overloaded.” Fowler’s voice was starting to raise and tighten. “I think both of you are perfectly qualified for this type of investigation.”

“Bullshit!” Hank stood, and Lorna just closed her eyes and wished for this to be over as quickly as possible. “The truth is, nobody wants to investigate these fucking androids, and you left _me_ holdin’ the bag!”

“CyberLife sent over this android to help with the investigation. It’s a state-of-the-art prototype. It’ll act as your and Russo’s partner.”

Hank exploded. “No fuckin’ way! I don’t need a partner, and certainly not this plastic prick! Or a rookie so green behind the ears she’ll go off and get herself killed in a week!”

“Hank, you are seriously starting to piss me off! You are a police lieutenant, you are supposed to do what I say and shut your Goddamn mouth!”

“You know what my Goddamn mouth has to say to you, huh?”

_Oh, fuck. No no no._

“Sir, I –“

But the Captain barreled right over Lorna. “Okay, I’ll pretend like I didn’t hear that, so I don’t have to add any more pages to your disciplinary folder ‘cause it already looks like a fuckin’ novel! This conversation is over!”

Anderson started to beg, bent over Fowler’s desk as Lorna pinched the bridge of her nose between thumb and forefinger. “Jeffrey, Jesus Christ, why’re you doing this to me? You know how much I hate these fuckin’ things. _Why_ ’re you doing this to me?”

Lorna turned, glanced at Connor. He was watching everything unfold like he was merely watching a movie.

“Listen. I’ve had just about enough of your bitching. Either you do your job or you hand in your badge. And you!”

Heart jumping, Lorna turned back to the Captain to see an accusing finger pointed her way.

“If I ever hear that you’ve pulled a gun on another officer –“

“But Reed was –“

“Ever!” Fowler roared. “You’ll _both_ be losing your badges.”

Somehow she knew he was talking about her and Anderson, not her and Reed.

Not wanting to ruin anyone else’s life alongside her own, Lorna grit her teeth. “Yessir.”

“Now, if the two of you will excuse me, I have actual work to do.”

Lorna couldn’t move, and not just because her legs suddenly felt weak and her blood was boiling in her veins.

Connor had stepped forward, and he had a hand curled over her shoulder again. He spoke to the Captain in a calm, measured voice, asking, “I wonder whether Lieutenant Anderson and Officer Russo are really the best people for this investigation?”

Fowler, already high-strung, pointed his accusing finger at Connor. “Hey, I don’t need a machine to tell me how to handle my men, okay? So get the fuck outta my office.”

The hand Connor had on Lorna’s shoulder tightened almost imperceptibly. “Have a nice day, Captain.”

He helped Lorna from her seat with a hand in hers and held the door open for her as they exited. Lorna couldn’t pretend that her heart didn’t fall a little as their palms slipped apart.

The entire precinct was staring at them as they traversed the maze of desks back to Hank’s, who was seated and stewing.

Lorna sighed. “You know he never would have said anything about me and Reed if you hadn’t gone off the rails.”

“He never would’ve said anything about you and Reed if you hadn’t discharged your weapon to save a piece of fuckin’ machinery.”

Couldn’t argue with that.

She reached for her coffee, only to find that it had gone cold while Captain Fowler read them for filth. “Shit…”

“Listen,” Connor addressed Hank, who had his arms crossed over his chest, defensive. “I know you don’t like me, or Lorna, but we’re going to have to work together.”

Anderson turned disbelieving eyes on Lorna. “When did you two get on a first-name basis?”

“Last night,” Lorna sighed, massaging the bridge of her nose again. “Connor came home with me.” She desperately needed some pills, because that was normally something he’d have had to pry out of her.

Hank made a face and Lorna exclaimed, “Not like that!”

“We’re _all_ going to have to make an effort,” Connor pressed on, making sure Lorna knew she was included in this debacle.

Oh, how could she forget? She didn’t even want to see Hank’s stupid face right now.

Hank, still scowling and grumbling to himself, not saying a word.

Lorna shook her head and took a sip of her lukewarm coffee.

“Now that we’re partners, it would be great if we get to know each other better. I know some about Lorna already, but not much about you, Lieutenant.”

Connor’s face, which had been lit up on a grin, fell when Hank still refused to answer him.

“He’s a lost cause, Connor. I normally wouldn’t tell you to give up, but. Give up.” Lorna dumped the coffee, still mostly full, into a trashcan at the end of the desk. She then stretched and sighed. “I have to use the restroom. I’ll be back.”

Feeling, as she always did, the gazes and glares of other officers at her back, she found her way to the women’s bathroom, which was just past the holding cells.

Ortiz’s android was in one, sat on the little bunk with its head in its hands. She couldn’t see its LED, but could imagine that it was still red, to match the blood still splattered all over it.

Finding herself feeling guilty, but not knowing any way to help, she reached the bathroom and locked herself in a stall, leaning against the door. Let her head fall back as she shut her eyes against the harsh fluorescents and fished for the two lime green pills she’d put in her pocket before leaving her apartment for the day.

PERCOCET  
10/325

One of them had a piece of lint sticking to it that she peeled off ever so carefully.

Lorna opened wide, tossed the pills in. They sat chalky and wet on her tongue, and she rolled the back of her head against the hard metal door of the bathroom stall.

After a moment, she kicked a foot out and used her boot to flush the toilet and crush any suspicion. Then opened the door and hurried to the sink, hoping no one would speak to her before she could reach it.

There was one other detective in the room, at the far sink washing her hands. She paid Lorna no mind as she cupped her hands under the faucet and sucked as much cool water into her mouth as she could, washing the pills down.

She stayed there for a moment, moist hands braced on the cold porcelain of the sink, watching herself in the mirror. Alert blue eyes changed swiftly to dull, heavy-lidded ones. The detective dried her hands and left the bathroom and the door banged shut with an echo only audible to Lorna.

Straightening, Lorna fixed the collar of her button down, flattened her hair. She was pretty, and not in a plain sort of way either. Maybe that was why Gavin couldn’t seem to leave her alone.

Back in the hallway, Lorna heard close voices. It was Connor, speaking to Ortiz’s android through the glass of the cell.

There was no reason to creep up on the two of them, other than that she was high out of her mind and knew Connor would be able to tell. So she stayed pressed to the opposite side of the column at the corner, cheek to the chilly brick, and just listened to them speak.

“I’m sorry,” Connor was saying. “It’s not what I wanted…but there’s nothing I can do.”

_Androids aren’t supposed to want anything_ , Lorna’s hazy brain told her.

Connor was different, though. He was a new model, one that more closely resembled humans. And therefore more closely emulated their wants and needs.

But there was something else. He was different in other ways, too, she just couldn’t put her finger on it.

“I know there’s something you didn’t tell me.” Connor’s voice took on a pleading tone. “I need to know, before they take you away. The sculpture you made, tell me more about it.”

The android must have been tongue-tied again, though, because many seconds passed before it spoke again. And even then all it said was, “I’m going to die…” It sounded sad, worse than sad. Hopeless. Like it had finally realized something no one should ever realize.

Lorna was glad this hallway was basically deserted – she could lean her head against the column and listen to the sounds of phones ringing, tapping footsteps, murmuring voices.

If she listened closely, she could fool herself into thinking she could hear Connor breathing…

_Thunk, thunk, thunk._

The loud sound startled Lorna, who stepped quickly around the corner, the world sliding into focus.

At first she figured Connor must be in some sort of danger – Gavin was back and bashing Connor’s head repeatedly against the floor.

But she soon realized it wasn’t Connor at all, standing back from the cell and watching wide-eyed as Ortiz’s android hit its head against the glass of the cell over and over again.

Lorna was in shock as well, the android’s forehead split open, metal stabbing through, blue blood streaking the glass.

“Open the cell, quick!” Someone said, and Lorna saw that it was Ben, who’d heard the noise and come to investigate.

Leaping into action, Lorna cursed under her breath, rushing past Connor and sliding her palm onto the scanner to open the door.

But it was too late.

As she reached for the HK400, its arm slipped from her grasp and its body fell to the floor, splattering blue blood onto her shoes.

Lorna stared at it, breathing hard, willing her eyes to stay dry. She was no stranger to dead bodies. Some cops went their whole careers without ever having to discharge a weapon, shoot someone, watch someone die.

During her beat in Forest Park, Lorna had a made a name for herself around the DPD after responding to a call about an armed robbery late one night, after which Lorna was able to shoot the fleeing perp in the left calf muscle clean across the darkened parking lot of a 7-11 with nothing but her Glock 22.

And that hadn’t even been the worst of it – Forest Park was a mess. OD’s, homicides, hit and runs, you name it.

And yet.

There was something about this android that upset her more than all of that. Something about how hard Connor had tried to prevent it from self-destructing, only to have it kill itself anyway.

“I’ll call CyberLife,” Collins told her. “Clean this mess up.”

As he strode away, she had no idea whether he was talking about CyberLife or ordering her to clean it up herself. All she knew was that she _wouldn’t_. She would not lay a finger on that thing, backing out of the cell and into Connor, who didn’t move away from her.

She just had the presence of mind to jerk forward and close the door, and then Connor was cupping a hand at her elbow, the same as she’d done a few times to him now.

“Your heartbeat is highly elevated,” he said in her ear, and she didn’t know if he meant to do that on purpose or not.

Lorna gulped, turning half in his embrace, still trying to keep her lower lip from quivering. “I’m so sorry, Connor.”

“What for?”

“You worked so hard, to keep Reed from hurting it last night. And now I just…” She dared to glance into the cell once more and regretted it, stomach churning as she turned her face quickly away, finding it instead against Connor’s chest.

“You didn’t cause it to kill itself,” Connor said, sounding confused.

“No, but I…” Her voice was muffled, and she sniffed, hands finding themselves at Connor’s forearms, holding on for dear life. It was the combination of the android’s suicide and the pills that were making her feel as though if she didn’t hold onto Connor, she’d float off the face of the Earth, that was all. “I should have been faster.”

Connor pressed her back, to see her, even though there was no reason for him to. His voice was so gentle. “There was no accounting for that. My own reaction time was severely lacking. I was…I didn’t expect it to do that.”

Lorna shook her head, trying to tell him she didn’t either without saying it. As she did, a piece of her hair came loose from the rest and Connor pushed it back, mirroring her movement from earlier.

“We should, um.” Lorna swallowed thickly, cleared her throat. “We should get back to Hank, see what we’re gonna do.”

But even when Connor released her and they trudged back to the duo of desks with everyone’s eyes on them yet again, Lorna didn’t want to try and talk to the surly old man. She wanted to make like him and get drunker than she’d ever been before.

She sat at the unoccupied desk and put her head immediately in her hands.

Connor must have sensed her irritation, as he leaned down low over Anderson and hissed, actually _hissed_ – an android, “I know you didn’t ask for this investigation, Lieutenant, but I’m sure you’re a professional.”

“Why don’t you go fuck yourself?” Anderson growled.

Lorna shoved her head further into her hands, because now the world was starting to spin again.

Connor glanced at Lorna, leaned down even further, and this time he placed a hand on Anderson’s back. “I suggest you sort out your personal issues and let us work with someone more _competent_.”

Wrong move. Or right, depending on how you looked at it.

Hank finally stood from his desk, but he took Connor by the lapels and swung him around, right into the glass paneling beside the desk. It shook so hard Lorna was afraid it’d shatter, looking up from where her head was still pillowed in her hands.

If everyone in the building hadn’t been staring at the three of them before, they definitely were now.

“Hank –“

“Listen, asshole. If it was up to me, I’d throw the lot of you in a dumpster and set a match to it. So stop pissing me off…or things are gonna get nasty.”

“Lieutenant.” Officer Miller had approached, hesitant, eyes flitting between Lorna and where Hank had Connor shoved up against the wall. “Uh, sorry to disturb you. I have some more information on the AX400 that attacked the guy last night. It’s been sighted in the Ravendale district.”

“I’m on it,” Hank snarled, and finally set Connor back on his feet. “Let’s go.”

As Lorna stood to grab her jacket, Hank noticed how she wavered, shooting her a nasty look. “What the hell’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing.” Lorna let the man take the lead, hanging back to question Connor. “You okay?”

“Yes.” Although he seemed to be past reminding Lorna that androids couldn’t feel pain, he looked shaken up.

Lorna remembered how he’d caught her only a few minutes ago, how he’d brushed her hair off her face, and blushed. She fucking _blushed_ , just because an android did something to her that a dozen men had done before with less of a reaction.

“C’mon.” She motioned for Connor to follow her as she led them out of the station.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lmao connor has no idea what 'turned on' means i'm losing my shit over him

**Author's Note:**

> this is a fucking mess lmao long story short dbh is the free game on playstation plus for july and i fell in love with connor the minute i saw that beautiful fuck. i never planned to post this, but then i figured it might make someone happy to read it and that posting would give me an excuse to finish it. un-beta'd - all mistakes are my own. and as much as i want there to be, there won't be any sort of regular posting schedule; i'm extremely busy with a full-time job and i write when/if i can rip
> 
> come say hi over on my [tumblr](http://peachmirukuu.tumblr.com/) if you want smooch smooch much love


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